Borg’s DFS Cash Lineup Review for Week 12 (Fantasy Football)

I’ve written about the weekly DFS process a few times in the past trying to give a “mock schedule” for those who want to get better.

Whether you have only a little bit of time on a commute or you are ready to grind away lineup tinkering on the weekends, it is possible to build a weekly process that works over time.

The goal of this article is neither to boast nor wallow in “shoulda, woulda, couldas” but rather give a transparent look at my thought process for the week. Hopefully, this will help DFS & Betting Podcast listeners and DFS Pass subscribers get a deeper window into the ups and downs of playing DFS and help you in your selections each week. On Tuesdays, Betz and I review our cash lineups, and this week we’ll give some common overreactions we see and hear.

For cash, I specifically play 50/50s, Double-Ups, and H2Hs on DraftKings. I’ll share my unfiltered gut reaction, and the thought process behind this lineup construction, and at the bottom, I will post my weekly results including the cash line and H2H record to stay accountable with you.

If you want to go back to the drawing board, we did an overview podcast before the season on DFS Cash Game Strategy + Creating Player Pools. I also published an article on DFS Strategy for Beginners and another entitled: How to Approach Each Position in DFS & Gain an Edge.

Week 11 Cash Lineup

Draft % and cash lines each week will be from DraftKings’ $25 Single-Entry Double-Up with roughly 5,000 entries. This is a slightly elevated price point from the $1, $5, and $10 double-ups and I think gives a solid idea each week of double-up roster percentages.

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The Thought Process

Cash Locks (In My Opinion)

• In our Week 11 DFS Best Plays (which comes out on Saturdays for DFS Pass subscribers only), I shared the pool of players and this week was blatantly obvious who the top plays were: the RBs.
• I never really wavered from a 3RB build this week. The field felt the same as De’Von Achane, Christian McCaffrey, and Alvin Kamara were three of the most popular plays of the week. Even if you didn’t get ceiling outcomes from any of the three, you knew the field would also lean in this direction. I never really worried about the chalk nature of these guys in cash but it provided massive leverage in tournaments if you went a different direction in tournaments.
• The only other surefire lock for me was Jauan Jennings. The WR’s role felt so secure and then when we received news that George Kittle would likely be out, he was in. Jennings has quietly put up similar on field numbers as Justin Jefferson in terms of YPRR. I know there were a lot of different options in the $5-6K range but the 49ers team implied total and Jennings role at his ridiculous price point made him arguably my favorite play of the week. Hopefully, you got on board because I also talked Betz into playing him in cash while he was on the fence.

Gut-Wrenching Decisions

My goal in this section is to discuss the pool of players I considered for cash and how I arrived at my final lineup.

• At QB, I sifted through Brock Purdy, Russell Wilson, Jameis Winston, and Anthony Richardson. “Paying up” for Brock Purdy felt relative because he wasn’t crazy expensive. However,I  noticed that I was sacrificing at a WR spot and the difference ending up being enough to drop down below the $6K range. I also theorized that I could “soak up the 49ers production” through CMC and Jennings without also playing Purdy.
• Wilson obviously had the pass funnel matchup in front of him against the Ravens. On the podcast,  I did share some of my concerns of the game environment with both AFC North battles going way under in 2023. Richardson had Pittman back but major OLine issues slid him down in our ranks from when we first talked on the podcast. I still played him in a tournament but the floor felt low on the road against a popular NYJ defense. Winston ending up winning out based on volume alone. His previous two games (41 & 46 pass attempts) loomed large in my mind on the road in a dome.
• As we mentioned on the podcast, the high-priced WRs never felt like priorities this week knowing how popular the elite RBs would be. Puka Nacua ($7300) was the only elite WR I considered in cash but I ended up continually down the stair steps of salary to make my lineup work. I liked Khalil Shakir ($6300) the most out of the group but I found that dropping down $1,000 from him to Cedric Tillman ($5300) was the only real way to NOT punt off TE. I also didn’t mind stacking him with Jameis hoping for some fireworks. Despite Betz talking up Jakobi Meyers on the pod, I won’t lie: my bias got the best of me. I didn’t want to play the guy.
• Kayshon Boutte ($3500) and Calvin Austin III ($3600) were the only punt guys I thought about playing. Austin was always more of a wishful GPP play and I knew the field would be willing to chase Boutte’s last three games were he saw six targets in each. With a mostly chalky build, that didn’t feel like a spot to try and gain leverage at all.
• I mentioned that if I had all the money in the world,  I would’ve played Travis Kelce. I also was terrified of Davis Allen being a popular punt option. I put him down as my fade in the Best Plays section: “…if the field is going to play a stone min TE this much, count me out in tournaments. There is just so much competition for targets between Puka Nacua and Cooper Kupp that you are asking to thread the needle for a TD based on one week of routes data where he surpassed Colby Parkinson in a negative game script. The Rams trailed that entire game… do you expect the same this week against New England? He has ONE red zone reception the entire year.” He air balled and Dawson Knox ending up being a good middle knowing that Dalton Kincaid was out.
• DST was a pricing switch up from TEN ($2300) to NYJ ($2800) and ultimately ending with my DST1: MIA ($3000). I figured the roster percentage would be spread out this week with multiple solid options at DST and that was spot on. Each of those three DSTs were 20+ percent with none of them getting truly out of control.

What Did the Field Do

My goal in this section is to discuss the pool of players used the most in cash style contests. You can compare the roster percentage, DK outputs, and how much of their salary they X’ed this week.

Mistakes Were Made …

Every week I’ll highlight my biggest mistakes which range from not weighing low-end outcomes to assuming, to not thinking, and ultimately moving away from plays I started with. We’ve all been there… stay water. Don’t try to justify yourself or make things sound better than they were. You made a decision, now deal with it.

• In hindsight, this was about as good as I could do with this lineup and the decision tree I ended up with.

2024 Results

Each week I’ll post my head-to-head (H2H) win percentage here to give you an idea of what type of week I had. Keep in mind there are varying price points, competition, and players who take my H2Hs in the lobby that have no rhyme or reason. The volume of my H2Hs differs each week due to my feeling of the slate and my weekend activities with my family. Every week I will also post the “cash line” from the $25 Double-Up from DraftKings.